THE 



PASSION OF ANGELS, 



OR 



i 






SINTRAM, SON OF THE BURNING EYES. 
A WEIRD, MEDIAEVAL TALE 

OF 

BLOODSHED AND CONSUMING PASSION 

IN THE FORM OF 

A PROSE DRAMA IN FIVE SCENES, 

BY 

LION. MARGRAVE 



§ 



PRINTED BY 
I^ESTER BOOK & STATIONERY CO., Atlanta, Ga. 



THE 

PASSION OF ANGELS, 

OR 

SINTRAM, SON OF THE BURNING EYES. 
A WEIRD, MEDIAEVAL TALE 

OF 

BLOODSHED AND CONSUMING PASSION 

IN THE FORM OF 

A PROSE DRAMA IN FIVE SCENES, 

BY 

LION. MARGRAVE 



PRINTED BY 
1,ESTER BOOK & STATIONERY CO., Atlanta, Ga. 



t \^- ^ 



P5d5ZS 



DRAMATIS PERSONS. 



SiNTRAM Son of Biorn of the Fiery Eyes 

Haakon Jarl 

Thorgrim, Father of lyovisa 

-p ^ r Brothers of Lovisa 

HUGI.EIK, A Hermit, Ex- Wrestler 

Kack, The Black Master, a Magician, not necessarily black or a dwarf, 

though Fouque calls him the Little Master, i. e., Satan. 

LoviSA, Beloved of Sintram 

Mei^korka Wife of Haakon 

Aasta, A Northern Sibyl 

The Mother Superior 

Sister Orny 

lyADY Verena, The— ^-r^ — *— a mute apparition, Mother of Sintram 

^ •a. 



Retainers^, Nuns, and Perhaps Angels. 



FOREWORD. 



^ Baron de la Motte Fouque, author of ''Undine", tells 
- in his story of "Sintram and His Companions", how 
^ Sintram overcame his passion for the innocent wife of 
another. In this play of action and weird effect, in a 
tale that is entirely original, it is shown how Sintram 
afterwards met his real affinity, how he — the lady un- 
witting — grievously sinned, according to the common 
notion of the world, but afterwards when infuriated by 
the same potionp^ that caused his first downfall, how 
he with his likewise maddened lover triumphed forever 
and a day, for good and all. 



Note. 

The only elaborate setting in this 5-scene play can be 
greatly simplified by acting the first scene with only 
two long tables, meeting at an angle with a small table 
seemingly presided over by a single occupant, the 
armor that represents Biorn of the Fiery Eyes. 

The supers thus can be reduced to a dozen, or 
a score. 



"THE PASSION OF ANGELS" 

Or Son of the Burning Eyes; or Death and the Devil. 

A 5-Scene Play in Prose. 

By Lion Margrave. 

ACT I— Scene I. 

A weird banquet-hall in Sintram's castle by the sea. 
A hideous storm without. The wind howls and 
shrieks in unearthly fury. A row of knights appear to 
sit at the back, on a raised platform wuth tables in front. 
The recess being in shadow, the lamp-flames within 
their eyes are plainly discernible, for the hall is but 
dimly lighted, even at the opening of the scene. Biorn 
of the Fiery Eyes, really his empty armor, is enthroned 
at this elevated table, crowded with festive vessels. 

The head of a large golden boar lies in front of him. 
A mask, with a face of wild and powerful expression, 
may be inserted into the front of the helmet, worn by 
Sintram's father. In that case, the beaver will be up. 
The casque bears two formidable wings, one on each 
side. The head may be thrown back a little, while the 
mailed hands rest upon the table. The other dead 
knights, by way of contrast, should have high black 
plumes that overhang at the top. Enormous tilting 
spears may stand attached to the back of each chair, 
and be draped with streamers. 

It is now midnight. A number of retainers sit round 
the lower board, or boards. Haakon Jarl is quarrel- 
some drunk. He occupies the seat of honour. The 



Little Master, roughly bearded and elf-locked, sits with 
a peculiar broad-brimmed hat low over his brow, and 
askew. His eyes are piercing and magnetic. His taps 
on Haakon's arm, as he tells a ghostly secret, though 
with ironic humour, are designed to drive him into 
frenzy. The Lady Melkorka has retired for the night. 
(The laughing of ghosts and demons, throughout the 
play, may be made more uncanny by cachinnating with 
the hollowed palm against the mouth, in the cr.se of 
smothered sounds, or through megaphones, for loud 
jeering and hateful jubilations.) 

Haak. Where is our miserable host? Have we gone 
round for a bed, and dropped at last among the 
bones of a cur and his kennel? Is he out now 
growling and snapping, and drowning his fleas in 
rain? Or, is it lice? I doubtlDut his pell lacks hair 
for scratching. How is it he thus slights our pres- 
ence? Have we grown to him stale and flat as the 
mead-horn's bottom, which, like manna, is unclean 
and without spirit after a night's exposing? 

L. M. This is the time of the curse I told thee of. He 
dares not sit among his kind, when the devils peer 
through his own and his fellows' eyes — madness in 
one soul setting fire to fury in another. 

Over-dabbling with maniac elements, under my 
guidance and my control, has brought back the 
ancient efficacy of an old-time spell. I would not, 
an if I were thou and desired an easy couch, even 
suffer a gleam of the lamp of mirth to light but the 
lid of a window of mine, if chance sent him ere the 
morrow's sun, ghosting across my path. 

Haak. Why this night more than others? Are there 
none left dare finger a nose at Satan? He has 



mooned about in a deepening, sullen fit, since first 
we broke his bread. An Arab thief out-manners 
him in this. 
L. M. We now carouse against that Festival, at which, 
half a life-time back, he whose armour sits in the 
center there, his father, enraged against a foreign 
guild, swore a vow upon the fetish of his cursed 
home. Laying his hand upon the Golden Boar, he 
bound himself by the deep things in hell, to spend 
the blood of whomsoever of German Hong, a 
Christian and a leaguer of that loathed sodality, 
hove in sight. 

Even as the oath expired upon his lips, a father 
and son of that same order threw themselves, noth- 
ing doubting, upon those bowels of his, courtesy 
called compassion. Yet because of his oath, and 
the hate that winked upon its cry for justice, he 
carved them up with flourishes, daily and nightly 
practiced in the East, that is, as the Book of Good 
Wives puts it, he smote them hip and thigh. 
j [Now, these poor lambs, despite their bleatings, 
were mighty men of God. And to make matters 
worse, the Angel of Death, in a rusty mood, was 
jshaken up in the depth of night, to search in the 
idust, forsooth, for two small leaves plucked, un- 
billeted, from the Tree of Life. After the manner 
of those who work in shambles, and themselves 
get rapped, he let off such a string of blankety- 
blanks, that I dare not, so potent is their magic, 
utter them, even in whisper, just as they came, 
word for word. 

The devils, thereabout, who heard them, pitched 
themselves in where they could for shelter. A 
lake stood by. They tumbled in. Though but a 
pool of vapours, it served. Mirage in physic fact, 



V 



Q 






y> 



6 



jjTl£_steaiji/of a] child just born — Sin- 
tram, the poor brat's name.^ And ever since, on 
the self-same night, the son of the Eyes of Fire, 
whether he will or no, takes in to himself, in bed 
or on the floor, the unclean host. 
Haak. Why does the fool pander to his phrenzy, by 
keeping around him this beetling wall of iron spec- 
tres — whose heads the damn'd idiot fills with 
flame? If the lights went down, as they are like 
to do in such a howling storm, if but a door 
swings to, it would make even the spine of a hale 
man, with easy nerve, shiver with the ice of mad- 
ness. 

Crack their sconces, the creatures that here in- 
habit, who eat no food but the burning sop of 
Tartarus, which they jerk as their Snap-Dragon 
out of the River of Fire, Phlegethon. Pull them 
over the tables, these heathen ancestors, and let 
them kow-tow to their juggernauts. 

(The Jarl's retainers rise.) 
L. M. If he come now and find them so, woe to those 
who fail to give the no, when he asks singly, has 
each man questioned, profaned the sacred dead? 

(The Jarl's retainers sit again, after looking at 
those of Sintram.) 

(Haakon remains standing.) 
Haak. My wife has' grown to me of late, more inso- 
lent and repelling. He is the cause. Her eyes are 
ever circling back to Sintram, as a lonely woman's, 
who sees herself a martyr, and finds a thousand 
times a thousand beauties in her god, the mirror. 
Lured by the rumours of the bears and wolves 
that swarm about, I housed myself with her be- 
neath a roof, that where'er I turn, gives open cover 
to a multitude of ghosts. These snakes of the 



dark, and here tis always gloaming, glide through 
the walls at every moment. The jealous distilla- 
tions that drip from off their tongues, have made 
of my naturally dormant malice, a welling passion 
that is verily more than gusher to a mere lust for 
simple murder. 

L. M. Plum-pudding, friend, thou hast mistook for 
pan-cake ! This be the sinners' day for brandy and 
other wicked license, merry mad-cap Christmas, 
not that miserable fast of sack-cloth — saving the 
cakes — sad, lenten shrove-tide. Put thy noisy 
clock back, man, till Boxing-day. Thou, and the 
time, will then be more fit for fighting, and he 
dispirited, and but a common man, whom thou 
beatest. Now, sit, and with a night-cap, drown 
thy sorrows, and have done with the wind, and the 
open door of thy mouth. Else we shall presently 
have such a flooding, as thy poor crazy shell can 
never meet, and after go with thy stern the right 
end up. 

'Ware Sintram when the giant rides him ! Thou 
hadst better, I tell thee, meet Gunther with Sieg- 
fried on his back! 

Haak. I would as lief drag off his skin and hers be- 
sides, as those of a pair of seals, that raw and 
bleeding-naked, beg with piteous eyes for the 
Christian charity, that sleeps above with Christ. 

By Heaven and by Hell, and by the Golden Boar 
and the Shade of the Burning Eyes, I will smite 
the devil he calls himself, a whip's cut or a sword's 
lash, right across his red and pulpy teeth, and with 
the agony and the shame, set his fiend howling 
mad against my own ! 

(He walks quickly up to the platform in the rear, 
and drags what represents the body of Sintram's 



father over the table, by the ears first, and then by 
whatever part he pleases. This he does with a 
great clatter of dishes and goblets, as the head of 
the large Golden Boar bounds to the floor below. 
Haakon quickly dons the body armour and the 
head piece.) 
L. M. I see a road they call the bier-balk, and a 
corpse supinely moving with stiff feet, pointing 
upwards to the Heaven, its soul is far too foul to 
reach. At the end of the path, a column stands 
which is snapt across. A wraith, which sembles 
thee, hovers about like troubled smoke. I hear its 
sad, sad cry whistling through the mournful, dead- 
green leaves of a long line of wailing spruce. Pre- 
pare to meet thy nether God, the skeleton of thy 
cupboard ! He blows that withering blast, which 
eats into the very rocks, and destroys more of 
those that sing, in a single instant of time, than 
even Roland's fearful trump. 

• Thou shalt smell soon without a nose. For 
why ?— Others, with their upturned nozzles in their 
hands, will do thy smelling through their mouths. 
Haak. Thou rank and loathsome frog, that goest 
a-waddle with thy children's eggs, in the form of 
warts and black-heads, stuck upon thy legs, I will 
give thee, red-hot, the iron spit and cook thy 
further croaking. 

(Haakon moves as if to come down, with his 
sword lifted in the air. L. M. slips off to one side 
of the room.) 

(Enter Sintram with long wild hair, and gro- 
tesque get-up, with perhaps huge horns that stick 
out horizontally from a guard-mounted bassinet. 
He wears a great cloak, and comes in swinging an 
immense two-handed sword. He moves the weap- 



on somewhat slowly al if merely menacing the 
beings he imagines are attempting to come too 
near. On reaching the centre, he lowers the point, 
and with his back to the company, gazes with the 
set stare of an hysteric seizure.) 

L. M. (Whispers loud to those about him.) 

The devils have got beyond the countermure. 
They have shattered the door even of the keep 
itself. If there be no diversion in his favour, no 
rescue before daylight, Bedlam will make its music 
shortly in the living house, that though it bears 
his name, shall never see its lord again. 

(Sintram turns suddenly, and looks around.) 

Sint. Where is Haakon Jarl? 

(Haakon, clothed in iron from head to waist, or 
to the middle of his thighs, speaks heavily and 
weirdly, with his left hand up against his mouth, 
or through such a speaking trumpet, as was said 
to have been used at sea, shortly before the end 
of Vanderdecken.) 

Haak. Hail, Sintram. Ghost, that stalks tomorrow's 
moon, and brings no babies in his bag, more mad 
and damned than I — How wouldst thou relish a 
whipping-post now in Hell? — A cloud comes rush- 
ing up. It shall be thy hearse, whose ink-black 
steeds, though proud and scornful, shift and leap 
affrighted. These fiery snorters shriek upon the 
ghost they see, which glides up droopingly to bury 
itself an^d its tears behind. Pitch thyself quick 
upon the mouldering casket, for the instant they 
catch th}^ rotten odors, they will hit the nearest 
Heavens in a bound, swift as that Vulcanian bolt, 
that in a moment, rips a forest and opens up the 
sky ! 

Sint. Who dares, with his unwashed "flesh, to make a 



10 



pole-cat's hide of my father's holy shroud? Come 
out and crave for pardon, or I will prick thee where 
thou art, and tear thee forth, as a rotten crab from 
its grave and borrowed shell ! 
Haak. Whip thy own dun carcase, thou cord-tailed, 
flicking, bastard ass ! — a Neddy thy father, thy 
mother a night-mare ! — Thou pumpkin-headed bug 
to whiten a sucker's heart ! — a thing of stinks to 
spit on, and not know from its buzzing, but 'tis a 
draughty pit of filth, alive with maggots and the 
gorge and fuss of blow-flies. 
Sint. Oh, this comes to me as a fanfare to him, who 
fumes against the morrow's peace — who fears the 
madness lurking in the night behind his thoughts. 
Have at me, and let us, if we have both to die, 
drink to each other, standing, from an upright 
stoup in each of spouting, life-hot wine ! 

(Haakon jumps down, and dragging or pushing 
aside one who sits or stands in his way, he 
mounts the lower table. As he leaps again, Sin- 
tram runs to meet him. A whirling and noisy 
fight ensues. The long two-hander, wielded with 
savage fury, keeps Haakon chiefly on the defen- 
sive. The iron plates are repeatedly struck with 
resounding blows, ere a quick thrust through the 
neck sends the Jarl reeling to the floor.) 

(Terrific thunder and wind.) 

(Laughing of demons heard through the hel- 
mets on the upper platform, the beavers moving 
slightly.) 

(Sintram throws ofif his upper garments.) 
Sint. I am Berserk now ! 

Are there any others here, whose bellies crave 
the drink of heroes — a brandy in Valhalla, they call 
the wine of life? 



11 



(Interval of silence.) , 

Strip from this defiler of my dearest dead, the 
wrappings that were meant only for kings — and 
not a Stamboul bitch-master, who shames the 
name of dog — a skip-kennel, whose prowess de- 
spite his noise, goes no farther than the murder of 
a rat, he finds a rival scavenger cleaning a pig of 
putrid guts. 

Give the birds that scream without this scarab 
dung-beetle, who has cased himself in for safety, 
and yet lost his life, in a mummy's sheathings ! — 

Come, all ! 

I am still, as Christ might have been, had he 
refused to die upon the cross, an army in myself. 
Who is this has robbed my father's eyes of fire? 

Jarl Haakon ! 

Well, give him a lych-gate in the nearest chapel- 
of-ease, that lacks a pew for dreaming! He shall 
have his chrisom on the morrow. His wife's my 
cousin, though a cozening one, I fear. Take him 
tO' the nearest bed of straw ! 

The table of the host, on this most holy day, 
should not be wet-shod monstrance, elevated in the 
blood of one that, though unbidden guest, came to 
eat his eucharist in Christian peace. 

Bub has made him babe again. 

Set this armour in its place — The throne of my 
father's burning ghost. 

(L. M. takes it, as he wants an excuse to stay 
alone, and foresees that the room will presently be 
empty.) 

(Perhaps bearing on his arm the garments he 
had lately flung aside, Sintram exits with all the 
banqueters, R, not counting Kack. Sintram may 
leave the picking up of the clothes, till he prepares 



12 



himself to ride out into the storm, at the end of 
the scene.) 

(Enter Melkorka from L.) 

Mel. Why art thou here alone? Like a haunted 
tigress, or one scared with the convulsions of 
Nature in upheaval, I creep for shelter with heated 
men, I usually seek to flee. My room, and the 
passages that wind about, are full of ghosts that, 
full-sheeted, go and come in flashes, when even the 
lightning leaves a black gap between one fork and 
the next. The air is sibilant with -hateful whis- 
pers. Rustlings, that are not of this world's mov- 
ing, fright me beyond the trusting of myself as 
comforter and guardian of myself. But even here, 
'tis dim and strange, and thou lookest as if thou 
belongest tO' the mines below, or even — well ! 
another sphere. 

Who is hurt? Where is my husband? 

L. M. He is safe and well, if the question thou pro- 
poundest be one that elliptically has reference to 
bodily pain, and nothing else. He now suffers 
more by way of peace than ever he has since that 
happy night, when his mother first began his 
swathing, and sang with him as constant genius 
of her many unmentionable, odd and scientific 
musings. 

Mel. What dost thou mean? 

L. M. The Valkyrs, or is it the Harpies? — Bear him 
with slack head and limp of hand and foot, through 
the black mountains, that are but moving bags of 
easy bursting cloud. 

Mel. I must go see him. — Where lies he? 

L. M. In blood and sticky straw — a gory, ugly sight. 
None will know, whether or not, thou hast given 
him kiss, or not. Close his eyes tomorrow. Such 

13 



as the night is, 'twill set thee spasming like St. 
Vitus. It might become a fixture. Rather stay 
and hear good news. Thy ship now bumps the 
jetty — 'tis full of pearls. Thou shalt now be, 
shortly, if thou darest, the wife of one whose very 
shadow, thou desirest to fall upon thy breast. 

Mel. Of whom dost thou speak? 

L. M. I have eyes, and they have followed thine. I 
see thou lookest oft, within thy spirit, upon a home 
and garden, that thou hast grieved till now are 
ever locked against thyself. If thou givest me 
some of the leavings of the feasts, say, a snack or 
tiffin, now and then, I shall keep open for thee the 
magic house, which so warm within, is yet to the 
scaler of its dark and icy walls, nought but an 
ending on a top stair of cutting glass. 

Mel. In what shalt thou find a sesame to open this 
precious cave, thou speakest of? 

L. M. By the distilling of certain drops, that have no 
honourable standing in the pharmacopia, or the 
Courts of Justice. 

If thou cheat him of self-respect, and make him 
seem, when weighed upon his own balances, a 
base, ungallant ravisher, if he leave his sin un- 
crowned with bridal wreath, he will when worried 
by his nobler reason, make thee in compensation, 
even if he love thee not unaided, his undetachable 
and lawful spouse. If he grow cold after, why the 
mad venereal philtres will clear him again of that 
muddy and muddled stuff, which in him rebels 
against thyself. 

Mel. Hast thou ever proved the power of the drops? 

L. M. I have, and often — never on myself, being a 
centaur, as one might say, that ever too hot and 
ready, wants no spur. 

14 



Mel. Does it not throw the body after into a sptmkless 
and long-weary sickness? 

L. M. No. 

Mel. Hast thoii any by thee? 

L. M. I have. I was just about to start this pleas- 
ant topic on the next meet occasion, when the Jarl 
drowned himself in his own malmsey, entering 
the womb again of his mother, Night. 

Why even that Simple Simon, Nicodemus, would 
have found in such parturience, twice repeated, no 
longer a puzzle from which to breed his foolish 
questions. 

Mel. What dost thou expect of me? 

L. M. Well, if thou but endure me rolled in the cur- 
tain of darkness, thou shalt suffer me to roll thee 
after as I may. There is none else throughout this 
land, from whom thou canst steal or buy this 
amorous and compelling liquor. 
Wilt thou ratify? 

Mel. (Nods.) Give it me! 

(L. M. gives her a phial.) 

L. M. Empty the whole of this. 'Tis but a single 
dose. Remember, thou dependest on me for the 
equally convincing fellow. No book of mine has 
been allow^ed to keep such part of itself, as before 
the tearing, prescribed the composition, in Latin 
or in Norse. For otherwise, if thou knewest the 
substances and proportions, thou wouldst of a 
surety, for such is the nature of the woman thou 
art, rob me of all further satisfaction, not only in 
thee, but in myself. 

Mel. How dost thou advise me to lead him up to the 
cup, that uplifts a man as the mad Sakti, which 
energizes a husband god, whose end in pagan life 
is a pleasure that never wearies? 

15 



_5•/^ f u ^ss 



L. M. Refer in thy first -speech to his wild looks and 
shaking nerve. Then get thy hands upon his brow. 
Use them gently. He who, in hysteria, has all but 
lost control, finds a saving and a soothing balm in 
a lady's tender clasp. Say thou hast that stickfast 
they call Nepenthe of Iberia, which when thou 
couldst not rest for shaking, thou hast used to glue 
thy shutters down. I trow, he has not slept for 
two whole nights. The caress thou givest his 
leaping brow, and the pitiful offering of thy liquor^ 
will seem as the palm-hung Father of Waters to 
him who staggering from a desert of sand, lies 
down with his head ever and anon beneath the 
stream, till not only his flesh, but his very soul, is 
cooled from end to end and steeped in liquid balm. 
(When L. M.^ has made his exit, quickly and 
stealthily, Sintram enters slow and sadly.) 

Mel. Thou lookest not well, my lord. What troubles 
thee? 

Sint. Ah! The worser half of me, which- is not really 
I, has played the mad dog's murderous part, killing 
frenzy and its victim, both in the self-same worry. 

Mel. I understand thee not. — Thy face is worn and 
over-pale, as with that wax of Adipocere, which 
burgling thieves draw for their candles from rifled 
graves. Wilt thou not suffer me to brew thee such 
metheglin, as yeasted first in the nectaries of 
Lethean lotuses, I often take myself when the 
night is hateful, and still keeps an open face in 
mine. I find that after, with the rising sun, such 
rhapsodies well unbidden from my bosom, as if I 
saw like Theban Memnon when I gazed on sand, 
a sea of rainbow-flashing opals, and echoed out my 
joy upon a pile or two of rocks, that to me, as to 
him, typified the mysteries of the God-head, which 

16 



in their musical depths are known only to Himself. 

Now, dost thou not own, thou art mad for want 
of sleep? 
Sint. I feel strained in my soul, I must confess, be- 
yond the power of endurance more. I hang by the 
weary hands to the cliff-top, which cracking omi- 
nous, tells me that unless I find new hold, and 
quickly too, the insane gloom below shall see in 
me, as it were, the flying shadow of my former 
self. Could I but sleep this night away, then a 
whole year of peace will follow after. 

(Melkorka empties the phial into a cup.) 
Mel. Then, take thee this, poor soul, and hurry thee 
off* to thy Morphean cave, where by its spell no 
evil eye — even if compoimded of all the ocular pin- 
points that float in space — can paralyze the man- 
hood in such as thee, unaided by a God. I shall 
foist myself upon thee as thy body-page, and hold 
thy head upon my lap for pillow, until thou sleep- 
est. I am thy cousin, and a woman who wraps 
herself in heavenly mantles, is the devil's most dis- 
tasteful foe. If thou shouldst lose thyself first in 
ecstacy, fear not; thou shalt also have thy pleasant 
dreams in slumber. 'Tis but the nature of the 
drug, to raise and then lay low^ 

(Melkorka gives him the cup.) 

(After a searching look, and being assured no 
mischief is intended by w^ay of vengeance, he 
drains the goblet slowly. He appears to be dis- 
cussing a new taste, and drawing into himself with 
all his soul, the promised essence of, first, elation, 
and then oblivion till the morrow.) 

(A great crash, as he sets down the cup.) 

(The armoured knights, at the back, laugh in the 
midst of thunder.) 

17 



Mel. Let me hold thy brow aWhile ! Cool hands, I am 
told, soothe the frenzied. 

Come with me, where no man, by his tedious 
and boisterous talk, shall make my medicine 
nought but a cause of more distraction. 

(Warders and other retainers suddenly enter, 
and with them Thorgrim, and the brothers, Gud- 
brand and'Tuta. All the lights go out, excepting 
two.) 

Warder. My lord! These men have just dragged 
themselves out of the sea, from a foundering bark. 
They now crave the shelter of thy roof. 

Sint. Give them to drink and eat, and bring them 
change of raiment. (Exit one or two men.) Let 
them lie here before the fire. I am not well myself, 
and must retire. I have taken that physic, I am 
assured, requires sleep at once, or its purpose is 
foregone. — (to the strangers) Are there others 
that hang upon the wreck? 

Gud. I cannot say. We swam ashore. A sister was 
carried off upon a spar. But we are sure, she could 
not have lived through that tumult, which has all 
but killed my father. The rocks have cracked his 
dislocated arm, and my brother here lay long in 
stupor, with his head torn by a piece of wreckage, 
which of an elder storm, stood up as a gaff, rooted 
deep in sand, where the breakers made an end of 
themselves and their booming. 

Though/ bound upon a broken piece of mast, my 
sister, even with such assistance, could not swim. 
She must have smothered finally half way between 
the vessel and the shore. 

Sint. A lady on the waters still, asleep, and no doubt 

^ fair and sweet of soul, and I, a rude and husky 

brute — though well nigh/ mad, yet in the prime of 

18 



health — I dry, and afoot beneath a roof? Not I! 
Where did ye strike the beach? 

Gud. Hard by an opening, which looked as the nar- 
row end of a long, square-sided moat, floored full 
with bracken. The blufifs here were crossed and 
re-crossed by intersecting pine and cedar, that 
leaned in places so as to form a roof, shut in by 
vines. 'Twas on the other side of the second clifif, 
and on the left of the castle, facing the sea, a mile 
from here. Great rocks made a long, high scarp 
against the entrance. From the top, I could see a 
light above thy battlements. 

Sint. I know the place. 'Tis an old mid-day dreaming 
bed of mine. There, a big-boned hermit, Hugleik, 
once a great champion as a wrestler, has near, in 
another cove, out of sight, a beacon and a low- 
browed hut. 

I and my clattering horse shall drag the snoring 
eremite from his couch of ferns. Together, we 
shall search for the floating brothers, that breath- 
ing breathless like corpses, yet need no Tishbite 
to lie on top, and pump the gas of life from mouth 
to mouth, or nose to nose. 

Mel. O stay, my Lord ! Thy sickness now is too far 
gone, for thee to riot abroad as a common, brave 
man may. 

Sint. Sickness for pulers and pullers, and sheets for 
midwives. 

Wars to me, with blasts blown from the breasts 
of hell, are ecstacies, uncompeered by such de- 
lights, as over-mellow saints unbosom in their 
Venus-smitten cells. 
(Great crash.) 

Enough ! Pandemonium, in its king, flings me 
on the burning iron of his floor, one of his bursting, 

19 



meteoric gauntlets down. 1 answer in as bold a 
mood, his clanging wrath with counter-lightings, 
shot from the volcanic nadir of the God within 
myself. 

I shout in the teeth of the genies of the storm, 
who blaze at me, astounded, through the thunder 
and the riven clouds : "I come ! I come !" — To 
horse ! To horse ! 

(Sintram exits swiftly through the door, that 
opens on the court-yard.) 

(All lights blow out.) 

(A sobbing of wind is heard, as if the demons, 
in and about the empty knights, were disappointed 
that Melkorka's potion had not been given a 
chance to shame and abase the pride of Sintram.) 

Scene 2. 

A wild coast facing a storm at sea. The hut of a 
hermit stands in the corner, L. Night. Frequent 
thunder and lightning. A rude beacon overhead, per- 
haps unseen. 

(Enter Sintram with Lovisa, unconscious, in 
his arms.) 
Sint. What is it so maddens me in the kiss and con- 
tact of this particular flesh? 

I am the ocean breaker, she my jutting mole, up 
which I run, and ever and anon overwhelm. 

(He takes her to the bank behind the hut, and 
there leaves her. Coming to the front again, he 
stands awhile meditating, before he gives the door 
a knock.) 
Sint. I mind me, how the Sibyl i\asta shone, as if she 
herself grew luminous with heavenly kisses, as she 

20 



told me with smiling lips, a wife would come to 
me, as an Aphrodite foaming from the frothy sea. 
This must be she ! 

Who shall damn it as a sin, that I feast at once 
upon the food which is my own, here and here- 
after? r^.^ 

She must, if her Jiie'^d she are to keep good 
company, be at once disrobed and chafed. 

Shall I pass such work on to another man, who 
would think it an ill office sent to him from Hell, 
so he should suffer tortures for his. penance after. 
If I failed of my giddy drink, with the sweet de- 
lirious bottle to my lips, would not the sportive 
maids between this and Heaven cry: ''Thou fool! 
Thou fool r 

The cordials here at hand, I shall of purpose use 
to blind her to my own condition. It will seem to 
her after, that she but dreamed a dream, for which 
she has never been accountant. 

(Sintram knocks.) 

(Hugleik opens the door.) 
Sint. Thou art badly wanted at the castle. Quick, 
take my horse! 

An old man's bones rend his gaping flesh. He 
and his bruised sons have swum, and after trudged 
to my home from a wreck hard by. — All else are 
dead, they say, and I find myself, none but they 
have reached the shore. 
Hug. Come in at once ! Thou needest to change thy 
garments. They hang with icy bugles. A fire 
within will give thee the warmth, thou shalt soon 
die without. Thou art wet from head to foot. 
Hast thou had a fall? 
Sint. Ay, more than one. 

But get thee ofif in haste. Send the horse hack 

21 



in the morning. I am well content, to rest here 
undisturbed all through the night. The change 
will give me sleep, and a dream that is not fitful. 
Do not stop for me ! I know where thy drink and 
physic stand, and what each thing is. My steed, 
thou wilt find on the other side of Blodoexe's 

barrow. 

Hug. But why hast thou come so far afoot? Thou 
seemest to me in very dangerous case. What ails 
thee? Thou lookest as one that glares in fever. 

Sint. 'Tis the night of the curse. Dost thou forget it? 

Hug. Ah, ah ! 

Sint. A living form afloat, as I tore along, begged me, 
or its spirit did, to leave my horse and seek a drag 
or rake of pine. Hasting down the rocks, I slipt 
and sank. When I gained a foothold on the 
sliding sand, the body had vanished in a trough 
that, though it turned itself inside out, had like its 
fellows, nothing left but sticks and broken weeds. 
This, the night of my father's damning, has 
lighted on me whilst still under the ban of Holy 
Church, for studying magic of various kinds, with 
sorcerers good and evil. Therefore, thou mayst 
shrewdly guess, the devils have me at more ad- 
vantage, than in the last years of good old Rolf. 

But off, and let me to the fire, to cease the chat- 
ter of my teeth and lips. Run, run, run ! — I will 
not listen to thee more. 

(Sintram goes inside to the fire.) 

Hug. (Speaking through the door) Well, when I see 
thee next, it will be as Doctor I shall come, for thy 
mind is now as that of a beast of prey, which, 
striving to burst its bonds, threatens death to itself, 
if it keep within, but death to itself and others, if it 
go for a space, free without. — Let me commend 

^2 



to thee an overpowering draught which, putting an 
end to thought, will save thy reason. And it may 
be, as with an ape gone crazy, thou shalt not then 
give to the winds, the kiting of my rended goods. 
(Exit Hugleik.) 

INTERVAL. 

(Sintram comes to the door.) 
Sint. A little more, and I had bound thee backwards 
to the naked roots of some removed tree. The 
ears of my conscience are now blocked to sound 
by Fever's fugile stuff. No logic gets a hearing 
in my mind, but the indisputable axiom which 
declares, flotsam is the lawful goods of him who 
finds— the more especially, if but in cypher, it 
bears his very name. 

(Sintram goes to the back, and presently re- 
turns with Lovisa, who is still unconscious. He 
takes her into Hugleik's hovel, and then bolts the 
door.) 

(Laughing of imps and devils heard off.) 

(Thunder.) 

PAUSE. 

(Louder thunder. Louder laughing.) 
(Hugleik re-enters, and after feeling at the door, 
and finding it bolted, he gives a number of loud 
knocks. He speaks through the opening at first 
when Sintram, with his foot against the door, 
opens it but an inch or two.) 

Hug. I suspected something strange. I watched, and 
saw thee carry in a woman. 

Sint. Go back a pace, and let me out ! Thou shalt not 
enter. 



23 



(Sintram comes out, and closes the door.) 
Hug. O, Sintram, I fear thou meanest not well. Thou 
art all in a quiver. 'Tis she and thou, I need to 
doctor first. Better the old man should wait and 
suffer, and even die, rather than that thou shouldst 
have that fracture unset within thy soul, which if 
not done at once, will never close. 

I appeal to that which I have ever found within 
thee noble, put down thy foot upon the adder's 
egg of sin, which yet is only hatched in thought! 
Thou temptest thyself, intent on yielding, strug- 
gling not a whit against the damned thing, but 
rolling with it as mongrels do, when in mock fight, 
they give but tender bites to other dogs, and drop 
no blood but only slime. 
Sint. Go, and let me be ! The Book of Destiny, on 
Hymen's shelf, has within it penned in fiery gold, 
that a wife, who is verily mine in Heaven, comes 
to me as a dream in a drunken sea. 

The bridal counterpart who thus, as thou seest, 
so shakes me, as one trembling spring inshot 
within another, cleaves to me in very sleep. 'Tis 
even, as if she sensed herself already — before her 
birth as my especial Venus — the waking glory of 
my life. 

Who but He that formed creation as it is, shall 
question how a man makes music of the only harp, 
that flies to his bosom of its own accord, in palpi- 
tating zest? — and keeps there ever after, snuggling, 
close well-nigh as God Himself? It comes but 
once in each man's life, the real affinity's rush of 
soul to soul. 

Avaunt, with thy foul and middened feet ! This, 
tonight, is private and most holy ground, more 
sacred, far, than where the Stone of Kaaba lies be- 



24 



neath its Meccan carpet; or even the slab, on 
which the toes of Peter likewise blacken beneath 

the pilgrims' million kisses. 

Hug. But it were a crime to take her in her present 
state, unhouseled, unconsenting, and if aroused to 
use her vision, most probably without a recog- 
nizing mind. 

Sint. How dost thou know, she shall not pass out as 
virgin as she passed in? 

Hug. I see it in thy -shifting eyes, and hear it in thy 
quivering voice. Thou shakest with the passion of 
desire, as a tree that with weak foundation, ceases 

^'or to rock till the gusty tempests have laid it low. 
My duty keeps me here ! 

Sint. She will rouse with the heat of the fire, and if 
so, thou'lt have spoilt my sport. Now, get thee 
off ! Seeing that the church has already stript me 
of my honour, for mere fanciful orgies in the dark, 
it will not deign, if I bare my secret soul, to cloak 
my own sins. It will but give my brow a mantling. 
If then, I wear a blush only for a wedding gar- 
ment, when I meet my lady, now spread out to 
dry, let the blame light on the kirk, that sent me 
to her so red and stark. 

But get thee gone, or I will show thee, how a 
blush rose even may fight with the hand, that 
strives to pluck it from its fellow ! 

Hug. I will not go. 

Better it befits me to crawl on mangled jelly, 
with the wedge between my legs and a pair of iron 
boots, than to suffer such nursing as thou designest 
now. If I leave thee, thou wilt linger ages after, 
ith an empty spectre ever escaping thee in 



wn 



25 



Limbo, while the soul in Heaven, it represents, 
shivers in memory of thyself as of a devil. 

Sint. I care not. 

Must I take thee for a mule that, after kicking 
his heels up in his master's boudoir, sets to and 
pulls to pieces, the fine things for which he has no 
taste? If so, I must trip thee up with a slip-knot, 
and drag thee out to the open, to dig for the grass, 
and a bed, with a pair of hobbles on thy feet. 

Hug. That, thou canst not do. « 

'Tis not in thee, old as I am, to beat me in a 
tussle. I am fresh enough for a brief spell yet; and 
though lithe and strong, thou couldst not throw 
me, even when breathless between the first and 
the second wind. The knacks of wrestling were 
never thine, as once they were deftly and daily 
mine. 

I fear I must do thy pride an outrage, and fetter 
thee as a maniac for the sake of his own health 
and peace. 

I tell thee I will so use thee, if thou do not at 
once make for thy horse, and leave the lady to the 
care of one, who knows how to make her charms 
of no avail as temptress. 

I will go backwards, reverent, to the shameful 
Noah, not thou. Thou wouldst play the merry 
Ham with burning eyes, and fill the world with 
soot. 

Now, back to thy horse ! 

Sint. Thou hast no weapon ! 

Do not force me to rip thee up ! 
My hand, I tell thee, is neither steady nor pa- 
tient. 'Tis more than like, I will kill thee. 

Hug. What! Art thou in such a fury? 

Sint. I even am. It astounds mvself. Ere I saw the 



16 



woman, as I came to thee, I felt myself assailed by 
frenzied yearnings. 

I could well believe it, if it were told me so, that 
a pimp or medicaster, with designs against a lady's 
holy calm, yet fearing for both her reason and her 
health, had practiced on me first with such fan- 
tastic brew as lifts the passion of a man beyond all 
human limits. 

Hug. Didst thou drink aught before thou left the 
castle — a potion not of thy own serving? 

Sint. Ay! The Lady Melkorka, my cousin, gave me 
a cup she called a sleeping draught, which she told 
me, elated strangely both before and after. 

Hug. Ha, ha ! She has given thee an Aphrodisiac, 
and meant its desire should turn upon herself. 

Boy, let me rope thee as Ulysses against the 
Syrens ! Let me enter, and with thee pray against 
the Sorceress Kundry, and the burning beetles ! 
Suffer me to blind thine eyes, so thou shalt not see 
the naked Lorelei, whose charms, as they now are, 
I dare not gaze upon myself! 

Sint. No, I cannot forego the coming joy, whose 
barest picture so frantically shakes my every con- 
vulsible part of me — my body, my soul — my spirit ! 
If I stay upon the earth like the Porter of Pilate, 
who shall tarry, as the legend says, till the coming 
of Christ, I shall never have such a revel as waits 
me now. Let me know what pleasure is in its 
wildest, most delicious reelings upon the verge of 
swoon, ere I turn to and seek to find a greater 
bliss in the passionless nothingness, called Nir- 
vana ! 

Hug. I must debase thee in another way. [He leaps 
suddenly in Sintram's direction. The latter jumps 
aside, but is caught with the second, backward 

27 



bound. But his hand, however, for some time, has 
been ready to seize his dagger. It is now jerked 
savagely below the hermit's ribs. Hugleik sinks 
down at once. Sintram bends over, and gazes at 
his face.] 
Sint. I cannot nurse thee, nor take thee as a para- 
nymph behind my purdah. Nor can I leave thee 
in the cold, to agonize an hour or two before the 
freezing kills thee. Heaven is ready for thee, and 
thou for Heaven, and the life thou stranglest here 
between thy beads, is but the rotten mortifying of 
thy heart and soul. 

So die at once, and be a natural man henceforth, 
with a counterpart in thine arms ! 

Sintram prepares to strike. He holds his hand 
awhile, as if half in hesitation. 
Sint. Thou wert ever kind to the fallen. No ! We 
cannot have sighs and groans to mar the music at 
Pomona's feast. I must have, tonight, my fill of 
the peace and ecstacy, which till this very time, I 
have never even tasted. If thou linger, we shall 
lose it both. Thy paradise is above, but mine, just 
now, here below. Short pain is a gift to those that 
without it, would suffer long. 

(Sintram bares Hugleik's heart, and stabs him.) 
Sint. Here, lie out of sight — till morning ! 

(He drags Hugleik's body behind the hut, and 
then hurriedly closes the door. An iron bolt is 
shot with noise.) 

(Wild laughing of devils.) 

Scene 3. 

A secret bed-chamber in Sintram's castle by the sea. 
Night. A lamp swings overhead from the roof, or 

28 



depends from the crook of a standard. Magical instru- 
ments, strange books, etc., lumber the tables and 
shelves about the walls. Odd weapons and bugles hang 
aloft. 

(Lovisa wakes for the first time since the wreck, 
in the full possession of her mind. Sintram is dis- 
covered standing.) 
Lov. Have I been ill? How came I here? 
Sint. I found thee adrift upon the sea. Unknown to 
any, I brought thee in through a postern gate. A 
sibyl, who houses with me here in my Donjon 
Tower, has helped me to nurse thee back to life. 
Lov. Where is my father, and my brothers? Were 

they lost too? 
Sint. No. They are in the same castle as thyself, but 
do not know thy bed is even above their heads, 
deeming thee long departed, and disparted, among 
the pickers of scraps below — the pike and cuttle- 
fish, the crabs and other pantophagi, that haunt 
the rocks and search the deep. 
Lov. Are any of them hurt, or sick? 
Sint. Thy father's arm is still tight swathed, and 
pendent on a sling, but otherwise he, like his sons, 
is well and strong again. 
Lov. Why didst thou not let them know? 
Sint. One ever enjoys with the greatest zest, the hu- 
man fruit with which he steals away, and with 
eyes that linger soft and lovingly, sucks its mar- 
row out in lonely shades. 
Lov. Didst thou so use me? 

Sint. In spirit, I did. Who can put up bounds, in 
sand or an iron coast, and say to the great ocean of 
the soul: "Thus far, and no farther?" I should 
have lost the little there was left of thee, which 

29 



hung upon a thread, and thou of thyself the better 
part, myself, had they known I robbed them of 
what — belonging to Him who makes and pairs all 
Comforters — was not truly theirs to give. 

Lov. But how wilt thou now break the secret? lean- 
not, having regained the power to choose, connive 
at more concealment. 

Sint. When the time comes to cry oyez to the public 
ear, I will promulge it frankly, shortly, and with- 
out stammer, the stray that in my pound, had its 
head eaten ofif before I pushed it in, bore no brand 
or birthmark for me to read its owner, or its father. 

Lov. O, thou rogue ! 

Sint. I will say, moreover, I picked thee from a whirl- 
pool that span, when I found thee, around a swan 
of wood, that had no eyes, whose prow and coun- 
ter, both, were sunk. Our beach, for miles along, 
is strewn with the wrecks of many ages. Who 
knows a boat without a pennon, a marked figure- 
head, or its name? 

Lov. Thou art a shuffling ram, that with brains 
a-stagger, moves with crooked feet.- — But I weary. 
Why not call them up? Dost thou think I have 
no hunger to set eyes on my nearest kin once 
again? 'Tis like a peep at home to one long ban- 
ished, even to hear the voices which there with the 
wind, whurried and murmured in the smoke, over 
and against the cracking of a pine-log fire. 

Sint. A wrong appetite for a nun, methinks ! Thy 
future cell, I ween, shall likewise know its pine 
and worry — and shortly end with the cracking of 
thyself, thy mind .on fire. 

Lov. I cannot, weak as I am, make out the real cause 
of thy hiding yet. 

Sint. Wouldst thou have the bird invite to its nest a 



30 



coil of snakes, to tell with hisses if they choose, 
but without their usual guile, whether or not the 
egg, it cherishes, was first theirs truly? — hatched 
by them, and after dropped by them, or not? 

I looked on the yolk, or meat, as anyhow mine, 
for possession, they say, is nine-tenths of the law. 
The shell they are free to take back and stufif their 
l)ellies withal, to wit : thy wimple and kirtle, the 
aglet babies and all the pins. 
. Thy brother sheep, decoying thee to a death, 
they themselves had no intent to die, lost thee in a 
ditch, and left thee without searching. Shall I re- 
store for burial, the life they threw away, that I 
myself found and vivified? 

Lov. But I went, knowing where I went, and of my 
own accord. I looked to the stillness and the 
sanctity of solid walls of stone, to develop in me 
the vision that sees the other world. I looked be- 
yond still further. I saw myself in union with 
those celestial nobles", whose fusing with a mortal 
soul makes that music, which plays not upon hu- 
man ears, but upon the chords within — those 
Euterpian strings, Cupid plucked, when he toyed 
with Psyche's harp. 

Sint. These weddings with the spirits of Paradise may 
still be thine, and that without the chilling of thy- 
self in the prison of a starving church. I will give 
thee a turret, sanctified to thy use entire. — 

But I see, 'tis trying thee beyond thy strength, 
to speak and think so much, so soon. Sip this 
cordial, left me by the Sibyl as a fend-ofif 'gainst 
the dangers, circling round thee in the first 
awaking from thy trance. Open the eyes once 
more, after yet another dreamless sleep, and thou 
shalt verily have used old Lethe for thy juvenizing 

31 



bath, and not as a sea of ink to drown in. 
Thou canst then take back the dead man's penny, 
and give old Charon sauce, for snatching so hastily 
at an obolus, not yet his for fifty years and more. — 
No, I will not listen! — Drink! 
(She drinks.) 
Sint. I must leave thee now — else thou wilt keep com- 
ing and going, up and down Avernus, neither dead 
nor alive, with Hermes ever at thy heel. 
(Exit Sintram.) 

t 
INTERVAL. 

(Enter stealthily Gudbrand, Tuta and Thorgrim, 
all with their swords drawn. The last has his arm 
still in a sling. One of the men carries a large bag, 
filled with a long rope-ladder, with steps of cord.) 
(Melkorka follows, but immediately takes her 
station by the door. This she keeps ajar, so as to 
hear as soon as possible, when anyone is likely to 
disturb the brothers, before the latter can get away 
with their sister. She has her mantle pinned about 
her face. She intends, if anyone approaches, to 
slip across the passage into the room, in which her 
party had lately lain concealed. She might have 
taken her stand outside the door, but is curious to 
see what is in this secret chamber. 

Gud. Lovisa ! 

Lov. Ah, thou here? And father, and Tuta? 

Thor. What, child, brings thee to this strange and se- 
cret bed? — Didst thou not know we were below? 
(She is partly dazed with the potion, Sintram 
has just given her, and does not answer. She is 
pondering on the word "secret.") 

32 



Thou didst! Ah, child! Hast thou slipt? 

Lov. What dost thou mean? 

I have been in fever — , a long time — and have 
but waked. 'Twas only a few minutes back, I 
knew I lived, and lay in a castle, whose owner I 
have only just seen, whose name I have not yet 
discovered. — Who is he? 

Mel. I hear a swift footstep stealing hither. Quick, 
help me ! Hold the door ! 

(Gudbrand begins to lift his sister up. Tuta and 
the father run to help Melkorka. Before they 
reach her, a sword is thrust through sideways. 
She staggers and falls.) 

(Sintram bursts in, savage and towering to his 
fullest height. He is about to give Melkorka, 
whom he does not recognize in the darkness, an- 
other thrust, wdien she cries out:) 

Mel. Don't ! I am thy cousin ! [At the same time, 
she tears open the mantle, which hitherto has con- 
cealed her face. Sintram leaves her, and begins a 
fight, fast and furious, with Tuta and Thorgrim, 
who both give back before an onslaught, which is 
like that of one possessed, for his constant habit is 
to excite and enormously elate himself, when he 
seeks to kill. W^ith a sudden leap, Sintram has the 
tw^o in line,, and with his right arm slashed, Tuta 
drops his sword. 

Gudbrand replaces his sister on the bed, and 
joins in the fight. He first pulls his father back by 
the arm, and points to the door. Thorgrim retires 
out of the fight, and steps across and bolts it.] 

Sint. How dare ye mount to this, the private end of 
my castle? 

Gud. How darest thou keep our sister thus unknown ? 

Sint. Be thankful, I have nursed her back to life. 



33 



How should I know hef sister of yours? And if I 
had, 'twere no great crime, to transplant and grow 
in secret, that beauteous tree, you had in mind to 
make a lopped and sterile pollard of. How dare 
ye look to the great gardener of Heaven for grace, 
when its fruit and branches, you despoil of breed- 
ing and cast aside? Keep to your own Penates! 
Having flung the God away, she is now and hence- 
forth, whether you will or no, whether she will or 
not, the Genius of my home. 
Take her, an if you can ! 

(The fighting has continued throughout this 
conversation.) 

(Suddenly Sintram springs upon the father, who 
has worked round to the former's back. He in- 
tends merely to disable him by a thrust through 
the sword-arm, but nevertheless gives him a mor- 
tal stab. Thorgrim turns Sintram 's weapon in 
upon himself. One of the brothers runs to the 
father, to see how it has fared with him. The 
other stands, a while inactive, trying to recover his 
breath again.) 
Sint. My God, I meant to maim, I did not aim to kill 
him. — (To himself) She cannot wed her father's 
butcher. So the devils watch upon the great 
mountain of my life, to unloose the sand and rocks 
beneath my ever-slipping feet ! — (To them) 
'Twas but an accident. Truly, I had no wish to 
kill. 
Gud. Well, we shall match this unhappy chance with 
yet another! 

(The brothers attack Sintram with great deter- 
mination. During the fight that immediately en- 
sues, the latter works up close to the fallen father, 
who raising himself on one arm, suddenly gives 

34 



him a stab with a dagger, either in his back or 
side.) 

(As the brothers cease for the time, the father 
receives a savage thrust through the heart.) 

(Sintram, who thereafter acts mainly on the de- 
fensive, is at last about to be run through by 
Gudbrand, when Lovisa coming up behind, springs 
and grasps the latter's sword-arm with both her 
hands.) 

(The man she holds cannot shake her off, though 
he tosses and pushes her with force.) 
Lov. Why should you seek his murder? He cannot 
keep me against my will. If I desire it — he is 
great and knightly — he will let me go. 

(Gudbrand even fails to get free, at first, after 
the dropping of his sword. He does not do so, till 
Tuta runs for the bag of rope. Then it is, that 
Lovisa shows signs of fainting, and Gudbrand gets 
completiJjy out of her grasp. He stoops for the 
fallen weapon, sheathes it, and then springs to the 
side of his sister, and hoists her upon his shoulder.) 

(Sintram has made his way swiftly to the side 
of the room, and torn down a huge, odd-fashioned 
bugle ; or it may be a trumpet, such as the old 
Romans used, that made frightful sounds — that is, 
a tuba, which is described as ''harsh and fear- 
inspiring." While fighting ofif the unencumbered 
brother, he blows a number of loud and furious 
blasts in rapid succession. 

(With his left hand now and again upon the 
wall, or with his back or knee occasionally resting 
against it, and still grasping the horn, he fights his 
way to the door. After beating his opponent a 
few paces back, he suddenly runs tottering to the 
bolt and slides it back. He repeats the same tac- 

35 



tics, before he is able to swing the door wide open. 
The frequent blasts are continued, until Sintram 
hears the murmurs and cries of his rescuers down 
below. He then blows just sufficient to give them 
direction as to the room he occupies.) 

(When the brothers hear the voices distinctly of 
those who ascend, Tuta runs to the bag of rope, 
the other turns upon his sister and lifts her up.) 

(Sintram attempts to cross the room, so as to 
keep the brothers engaged with himself, till his 
followers can come and cut them ofif, but after a 
few steps, he sinks down in the centre. 
Tuta. Here is the room she told us of. 

(The brothers hurry ofif into a room communi- 
cating. Tuta has unhooked the only lamp, and 
taken it in with him alight. He leaves the stand- 
ard lying on the floor. The sound of a bar is heard, 
being shot into iron loops.) 

(As the curtain slowly falls, with the rays of the 
moon on Sintram's face, a number of his men 
rush in.) 
Sint. Down to the gates ! They have bolted the door. 
We have no ram to force it. Seach the wall be- 
neath the nearest bartizan. If they have no horse, 
ye shall catch them, if ye make circles round about. 

Anyhow, see ye mount yourselves ! Away ! 

Let two or three guard me, and help staunch my 
wound. — I faint ! 



ACT II. 

Scene. — The garden of a convent, standing in a 
Fiord. Sun-down. A large tree hides the top of the 
wall, R. C. 



(Enter R, Orny and Lovisa, both dressed as 
nuns. Lovisa's hood is on her shoulders.) 
LfOV. You weary me with this sacred, sapless talk. 
Has the life which is highest no zest, no ocean 
spray? — no hasty wind, that jumps the pleasant 
rack along in sportful mood? Must one there 
above ever breathe but nostril deep? Does not 
ecstacy in Heaven suck in to the very depths of 
breast and limb? 
Orny. We must purge our souls of delight in all that 

appeals to sense. 
Lov. But does the spirit, then, lack strong feeling? 
Are the angels only a lot of wishy-washy sisters — 
who for their lives dare not show to God the bliss 
that God's creation here below, when health is 
good, finds in vim and speed and even shouting? 
According to such as thou, we must allow our- 
selves admiration only of the flowers, and that, if 
we would stay in Paradise, must lack all sign of 
sparkle, and of warmth. If thy teachings be true, 
th£ eye must give no flash of joy — else the soul itself 

would catch on fire. 
Orny. But the flowers speak to the spirit only. 
Lov. Not to the nerves, thou thinkest? Is it not with- 
palpably moving lips, they appeal to the sense of 
vision? As if the kisses, that hung upon those 
lips, were inspired by an essence which, distilled 
in cups and bugles, set the feet tripping, not only 
of bees, but the best of men. These fruitful chil- 
dren of the grass prove, in my esteem, that the 
riotous use of sense is not of itself a sin. 
Orny. But we are suffered to enjoy them, only be- 
cause such things grow in Heaven— reflecting 
virtues, we know not what, in God. 
Lov. Does not the manly man, then, grow in Heaven? 

37 



(Orny is startled.) 

Does he not too reflect, and more thoroughly 
"^j^P^-^^ the e^e-TTTOst give no flajife-^TToy^ 
>r^Ei~j>Sy its^Tf would ca'hr^i-ett-fife. T^E Leinr r/n^ n^ ,s sa'J 
\H Holy Writ, made him— impossible to believe, ac- 
cording to your tenets — actually an exact copy, a 
living one, that is, of his most potent, beautiful 
and most holy person ? 

Why in his most masculine presentment, does 
man so move our womanhood, the more he and we 
are seekers in the largest sense after the God, 
whom I have heard called, God beyond God. 
Orny. Ah, thou hast listened to the unchaste devils. 
Poor child ! Such thoughts, so dwelt upon, let 
alone the speaking of them with heat, will shut 
thee out a hundred, hundred years from Paradise. 
Lov. Paradise, without a lover, is but a silent harp 
without the player's hand to ravish the air, the 
harp itself, and all its hearers, with the voice of 
the Orphean Christ within. 
Orny. (), this means for thee. I fear, wasting long 
away, and crying in Limbo, like Ixion, age after 
age, in the cold midway deserts between the stars. 
Lov. Did He not make them male and female? — say- 
ing, Tis not good for man, and therefore woman, 
to be alone? 

Who gave such as thou license to disjoin that 
blessed twain of whom the Father said: "Let no 
one sunder?" 
Orny. \\'e of the true church cut off the limbs that do 

offend. 
Lov. How is it then you bear your thigh-bones? You 
should have no use for seats. 
(Orny is sore amazed.) 

38 



Art thou pleased with thy naughty, and knotty 
legs? 

(Orny is horrified.) 

Ah, I understand, you are limbs of Satan ; you 
have cut yourselves off entire. — Thou shouldst 
not look on Heaven with horror. Look down upon 
thy feet ! They are three sizes too large. If thou 
hadst true delicacy, thou shouldst have cut off thy 
toes. 

Orny. Thou art past redeeming. 

Lov. Then, my pawn is lost. But what of that? I 
have a knight, my own, who though mated, still 
sweeps the board and goes unchecked. — 

But to return to the muttons, and leave the 
gigots, offending you if another's, but pleasing if 
your own : — Who, in Heaven, finds offence with 
those that, in whom all beauteous colours harmo- 
nizing, produce the Perfect White? The Saint of 
Patmos, and the best of prophets, described be- 
tween them the Lord of Paradise as of snowy hue 
Himself, sitting in the midst of gems, and circled 
round with rainbows. — I ever loved the jewels. 
I will deck myself, and fill my caskets, there in 
Heaven, with opals and all rich, flamboyant stones. 

Orny. Thou art grown sensuous, and luxurious, in 
thy fancy. This is not well. We must scourge 
ourselves from all enjoyment traceable, directly or 
indirectly, to carnal appetites. 

Lov. What else proves the spirit has sensuous fibres 
too, but the rapture the mother feels in contact 
with her babes? What greater luxury in the kiss 
of nerves, canst thou find than this? 

How comes it that you, and all your church, ex- 
press no horror in that delight the parent sucks — 
mind thee, sucks from the child, she herself dan- 

39 



dies naked on her bosom? In what does the sin 
lie, when lover thrills with the arm of lover round 
his neck? In what does the latter's ecstacy differ 
from the parent's, wdien both look to Heaven for 
the source and increase of their bliss? 

Orny. Where hast thou learned all this about lovers? 
If such were thy feelings, what brought thee here? 

Lov. I have learned the Science of the Heart by pon- 
dering, night and day, in solitude, on the nature 
and the desires of the Spirit who, Himself the 
Spring of Love, wooes the lover into His own 
great arms, by letting him feel the affinity is but a 
gift, and part of His own sweet essence. God, man 
and woman are a blessed trinity, and Heaven is 
full of triads, that are even so, Deity and dual 
angel. 

The highest and only needful priest, when affini- 
ties truly meet, is the Being who, participator in 
all pure delights, is Himself the First of Bride- 
grooms. 

Orny. O, horror of horrors ! 

Lov. Run, run, thou poor, silly virgin, that with a 
sorry rush-light, thinks she has the lamp, shall 
carry her to the Inmost Chamber ! Now, I will 
shock thee with a secret truth — and thou canst 
after tell it, if thou wilt, in Gath ! The flash pre- 
cedes the greater light. — 

My lover's spirit, and he is still a man alive, oft 
walks with me (I feel his presence) even where 
the nuns stand thickest. I know then why the 
saying is so precious : "I in you and you in me." 

Orny. This is the rankest blasphemy ! That means 
only of Him, who Himself had no mate. 

Lov. An angel mate is food and stimulant, and He 
told His disciples. He had meat they knew not of. 

40 



Orny. Barest thou match thyself with Him? — a man 
and thou and He, all in the self-same breath? 

Lov. Did He not teach, "greater works shall ye do?" 
Therefore, 'tis nothing hopeless, to aspire to be 
as He. 

Orny. But when He uttered "I in you", it was plainly 
signified between the lines, that He, and He only, 
should remain the Master Spirit. The servant, he 
declared, is ever beneath his Lord. 

Orny. Thou hoodest up thy reason, as those do who, 
on trestles in pagan woods, dedicate their lusts to 
Bel and Moloch. We are not suffered to let our 
fancy go where it w^ill. 

Lov. But whether we will or not, it being itself the 
Spirit, it goeth where it listeth. When thought is 
tense in motion, and not vapour-light and formless 
as the bovine reverie, 'tis no idle roaming. Con- 
ception does. Her progeny then is live and solid. 

Orny. I must bring to thee one who knows how to 
teach thee the only bookish arguments, that have 
countenance here. Else thy flesh shall be flicked 
aw^ay, till thou hast nothing left of silk or satin, 
that still adheres. The Mother Superior, as it is 
right she should be, is hard to those who are too 
free. — What dost thou mean by a lover rustling 
ever among us, when we eat or sleep? Is it not a 
devil, thou feelest, of passion — Priapus or Fawm — 



in angel's shape 



Lov. No, indeed! It is the Lord Sintram, at whose 
castle I lay awhile in fever. My brothers told me, 
ere I first became a nun, that he had lingered long, 
and after died. But suspecting, as time went on, 
they had a purpose in speaking as they did, I put 
some crafty questions suddenly to those, who 
served without the gates. The answers, I got, 

41 



were shame-faced and evasive. I know for posi- 
tive, he lives and rides around these walls. 

Orny. I fear, thou hadst no business to enter here. 
What moved thee to come here at all? 

Lov. I was taken in half a dream, overcome in part, 
by a sleeping draught. I was sapped of indepen- 
dent will, and careless too from the long tossing 
of a fever, in which the maniac ghosts made merry 
with my brains, and told, I fear, my virgin secrets. 
Then, my brothers forced me here, inspiring me 
with a passing horror of him who, they said, killed 
my wounded and defenceless father. Ere I met 
him, men had not seemed to me so desirable, that 
I should forego the Heaven I thought a nunnery, 
and make of one of these drunken animals, a life- 
long brutish mate. I yearned to live in Fairy 
Land. I craved to bathe myself entirely in the 
presence of those, whose very touch and breath — 
though invisible, palpable — makes even the psychi- 
cal hair upon the head, when the acme comes, run 
and jump with thrills. 

Orny. But a convent is not meant to pander to soft, 
luxurious thoughts of such a sexual kind. We 
must mortify the nerves, starve and cut the flesh, 
deny ourselves all taste of pleasure. 

Didst thou not find restful freedom in thy pray- 
ers, and in contemplation over the lives of saints? 

Lov. Ay — but I ever found, my holiest and highest 
efforts drew into myself more strongly than at 
other times, the soul that assuredly no woman's, 
caused throughout my flesh such a rush of joy, 
which grew the more delicious, as it closed and 
spread more intimate, and filled my being. My 
God, at once, became more darling and more 
precious, for the gift. It seemed, in part, a mani- 

42 



festation of the Divine Himself. I take it that 
such unseeable union, unless one has the second 
sight, is marriage in its best and purest sense. So, 
though in a convent, myself a full-fledged nun, I 
cry to thy very teeth : "Hail, Hymen ! Hail !" 
Omy. The maniac ghosts, thou spokest of, still keep 
house w^ithin thy brains. Thou shouldst go back 
to a bed of sickness, and there have around thee 
surgeons to cut out thy cancers, such as he who 
plied his steel on the robber Procrustes' over- 
growths. — I must report all this thou hast here 
imparted, for so we are enjoined. 
Lov. Well, report ! Explode thy bomb ! Bring down 
the cobwebs, which find in the free air nought 
but dirt. 

I glory in this my wedded state, and I see myself 
before the judgment throne of Heaven, a clean, 
white lamb, gently used by other lambs — and not 
as thou, a goat that cannot contain itself, but butts 
and messes where'er it be. 

(Orny whispers in Lena's ear. The latter nods.) 

(Orny stands back, silent a space.) 

Orny. Dost thou know, they bury alive such as thou? 

Thou art indeed wedded, and yet in such wise as 

animals, that know not priests for what they are. 

Lov. If they did, 'tis like they would seek, as I do, my 

sacraments only at the hands of angels. 
Orny. This would be a terrible scandal, should it get 
beyond the walls. 

(A bell rings for vespers.) 

I dare not stay with thee more. Our ?^Iother 
must be told at once. 
(Orny exits, L.) 
(Two nuns enter from R, and cross to L.) 

43 



INTER.VAL. 

(Lovisa at length moves slowly, as if most re- 
luctant to go. When she has nearly reached the L. 
exit, the Sybil Aasta suddenly appears R, and calls 
her back. The former is in the costume of a lady 
of means, which she has assumed to get entrance 
into the convent. This she has done by pretend- 
ing to fall sick, while passing the gate, when trav- 
elling by. The Sybil speaks quickly. 
Sybil. Stay and listen ! Thy life depends upon thy 
stay. I have been watching for this chance. Thou 
dost not know me, child. I come from Sintram. 
None here must know it but thyself. I came as a 
traveller, seized with sudden sickness, when pass- 
ing by the gate. I am versed in sciences, not 
known to thee. They showed me, the unseen mas- 
ters, thy life is now in danger. 'Tis she they call 
the Mother here, who will deem it expedient, to 
remove thee. Otherwise, she is full aware, the 
world outside will say, as they said of Roman 
Christians in the Catacombs, the convent is a 
bagnio, a hot-bath for the monks. 

(The Sybil throws a cord over the wall.) 
(It may be sooner, it may be later.) 
Syb. There is no time to lose. They will send out to 
find, why we two, of all others, dare stay away 
from prayers. Thou must, on no account, enter 
that house again alone. If thou dost, thou wilt 
never again gaze, in this world, on the broad sweep 
of Day. This cord will save thee. Sintram waits 
near at hand. His signal is that vesper bell. — He 
even now pulls the rope. 

(The sybil draws back a ladder made of cord.) 
They will send for me at any moment, and the 

44 



purpose of that sending will be a locking-up, and 
a murder, done in the secret name of Holy Church. 
Lov. But why? What have I done?— beyond a little 
talk? 

Syb. I see thou hast not learned, being brought up 
alone with men, those generative physic details, 
most women, schooled by women, know. 

Thou wilt soon be a mother, but evidently lack- 
est suspicion of something real, thou must have 
gone through in a trance, or stupor. 

Lov. But why should there be a penalty for that — and 
one, besides, meted out in death? Is it not hon- 
ourable, sacred even, to be a parent? 

[The sybil has now secured the ends of the 
ladder.] 

Syb. There is no time, now, to speak of that. Quick, 
mount the ladder! 

Lov. Why should I not boldly tell them, I wish to 
leave the convent? How dare they keep me? 
Have I no brothers left, to sack and burn the nun- 
nery, they have made either a dungeon or a 
slaughter house? 

Syb. Quick, for thy life, and mine ! I tell thee, I know 
by my secret art, they would put thee to sleep 
before thy time — bury thee probably after, with a 
stone chained round they neck, in the sea or in the 
lynn-pit below the fall — or, more safely, burn thy 
poisoned body, and let the wind feed on thy ashes. 
'Twould be an easy, truthful thing to tell thy 
brothers, thou hadst passed away in sudden sick- 
ness. 

The Mother Superior feels herself a natural foe 
of mine. She has already observed I do not speak 
and act, as one that moves by canon, and that un- 

45 



written law, which rules* the papist. As she herself 
is crafty, she now doubtless links me with thee, as 
both have failed the present vesper. — 
They come ! Quick ! mount ! 
(As they are looking off L, two nuns swiftly 
glide in from the right, and push the sybil aside. 
One of these, the Mother Superior, rushes by and 
seizes hold of some part of Lovisa's dress. The 
latter had already begun to climb. 

Lov. Sintram ! Sintram ! 

(Other nuns run up from the L.) 
(Sintram, who ere this had reached the top of 
the wall, drops down inside. After unlocking the 
fingers of the Mother Superior, and thus freeing 
Lovisa, who mounts higher and disappears, fol- 
lowed by the sybil, he pushes their savage enemy- 
in-chief back several paces. He then walks quickly 
to the foot of the "tackled stair." The Mother 
runs in, and bending to the ground, clasps him by 
the legs. He whips out a dagger, and gives her a 
stab, and then sweeps the point round in the faces 
of several nuns, who have gathered close. When 
the Mother lets go, she staggers back till sup- 
ported.) 

Sint. That was but a single prick among the many 
thousands, thou shouldst, if not a hypocrite, have 
ripped thy flesh withal. 

M. Sup. For laying- thy murderous hand upon a holy 
sister, thou shalt sip fire forever in the Burning 
Lake. Even before thou sinkest into the pitiless 
flames, I will set those on, who shall see no further 
spiritual harm is done thy paramour. She shall sin 
no more, and after a long fast in such oubliette as 
I shall give her, she shall lie upon the rack in Pur- 
gatory, till such time as the angels suffer her to 

46 



crawl, with broken joints, into that Paradise, 
which thou shalt never reach. She and thou shall 
never, never meet again. 
Sint. Well, thou damned, and thou damning Norn, 
thy prophecies give no earnest of their truth. We 
shall presently ride side by side, steed by palfrey, 
lord and mistress, knocking their ribs, the one 
against the other, as in the old days before the 
Fall, when the bones and flesh of Adam and Eve 
heaved and clove together, all in the self-same 
shoes, all in the self-same hat — for right-down 
savages, ye know, wear nothing else. 

She is like now to find more Heaven with me on 
Earth than after this life, thou shalt for many a 
day, discover in the ditch outside of Paradise. No 
soul ever entered there, that had it in her, when 
the back of Deity was turned, to look so like a 
sacred devil as now thou dost. 
M. Sup. O, thou accursed! ! — 

I will have thee, herself, and her babe unborn, 
blasted and excommunicate, this life and the next, 
by all the powers that wither from the seat of 
Christ in Rome. 
Sint. There be Holy Satans still, who jealous of peace 
and pleasure, walk and pray for suffering, even 
among the sons of God, as in the days of Job. 
Yet, though thou givest me the boil from sole to 
crown, it shall be thou, not I, will now "sit down 
among the ashes, and go to pot." 

(He turns and begins to mount.) 

(An old nun, not Orny, who has sidled up, 
plucks the dagger from Sintram's belt, as his back 
is turned, and stabs him with all her force.) 

(Sintram flinches badly, and clasps one of his 
hands to the wound. He kicks out occasionally, 



47 



as he ascends, to keep off the nun, who mounts the 
lowest rung, and attempts to cut his feet. 
Old Nun. No— Thou shalt be the first! 
Sint. The Devil take thee and thy sherd ! — thyself, for 
spanks without thy shirt ! 
(Exits hurriedly over wall.) 
(Quick curtain.) 



ACT III. 

Scene. — ^he platform of Sintram's inland castle. 
Wild mountain scarps around. Water-fall seen back, 
centre, up the heights. Pines and other Norwegian 
trees on slope and level. Full moon-light, no moon in 
sight. It grows suddenly very dark, near the end of 
the play, and before the final vision. 

(Sintram is discovered sitting at a table, on 
which are the remains of a supper for two.) 

(Lovisa appears just at the wings, R, and after 
speaking a single line, turns slowly round and 
exits.) 
Lov. The barby sleeps ! Come down to the garden. 

(She exits, R.) 

(Sintram follows her.) 

INTERVAL. 

(L. M. peeps over the parapet, between thick 
masses of ivy. Then he climbs over, and goes to 
the table. He looks first at the flagon, and then 
into each of the cups.) 
L. M. Ha. ha ! ha ! 

Now, my pretties, so clean, so dainty, before ye 

48 



die with unexpected pang, ye shall sin with your 
tongues shooting, as witches do, when the hoary 
Goat-Legs sits and blows their bestial appetites 
into raging flame. And she, the unwitting trollop 
of the past, shall know, and love the knowledge, 
how it all came about that he, the proud master of 
his passions, leapt upon her agaiiinst his better 
will. — After the cup of lust, the cup of death! 
My, my, what screams ! Ha, ha ! Ho, ho ! He, 
he ! He and she ! She and he ! 

(L. M. dances around with his hands working in 
frenzy, making barbarous noises.) 

(Low laughing of fiends off — some derisive, 
some rejoicing.) 

(The Sibyl enters suddenly, R.) 

Sib. 'Tis as I thought, thou devil ! 

How gotst thou here? — My guides have warned 
me of thy presence and thy poison. 

L. M. Ah ! ! When I once lived here, I fossicked 
round, I devised, I put in pegs and dug my way. 
'Tis a secret, though. I tell it thee; the lord and 
master shall never know. — (The Sibyl moves, as 
if intending to call over the parapet. He intercepts 
her.) Where art thou going? 

Sib. To warn those whom it most concerns- for I am 
sure from thy dancing and my visions, that Death 
is close upon thy heels. 

L. M. Thou shalt tell them then in spirit — rap thy 
message on the walls, spell it out with a ghostly 
finger — for I shall now cut out thy tape-worms, 
and with them, the glib bloody thing that wags so 
bold. That tongue it was caused my undoing; 'tis 
meet in Hell, that by me, it should ifself now be 
undone. When my lord reaches Heaven, thou 
mayst then tittle-tattle once again, if but the fat 

49 



lolly-walloper can but find its socket true. 

(The sibyl backs to pick up a knife. L. M. 
bounds upon her, and bends her head over the 
table, or a chair, his hands meeting around her 
throat.) 
L. M. Now I will take thee off below, and set thee 
peering on thy crop and gizzard, and all the agita- 
tion that writhes within, just as the Lama does^ 
who ripping a door to his belly, ponders Buddha- 
wise, upon the secrets below his navel. — 

We will laugh and scream together, though in 
different keys. I must even hasten, for I have a 
couple of nymphomaniacs, troubled with satyria- 
sis, whom as a physician, I must presently cup and 
give phlebotomy, ere they go too far. Such hot 
pleasure as theirs is not fit for aught but Hell. 
Time and place, I say, for everything! 

(He has been pulling her off, while he 
speaks, L.) 

(He now exits.) 

(Laughing of demons heard off.) 

PAUSE. 

(Enter Sintram and Lovisa, right.) 
Sint. What is it in me now stirs so frantic, when I 
even think of thee? If thou by chance touch me, 
my whole being is convulsed. Where would be 
the finish, if the sea within went on without re- 
straint? I would smother thy precious dust in 
kisses, and drawing it beneath the bosom of my 
ocean, I should even sink with it, void and without 
decent form, down to that pit of dreams where 
Riot, though reigning, kicks up its heels in lawless 
sleep. 

50 



Lov. I too am frenzy-wild (I never knew the like) — a 
gurge sucking down a whirlpool, eagre gulfed by 
maelstrom. 

But does the great God approve of the gallantry 
of such fierce comminglings? — such madness of 
delight? Yet, is He not Himself, when rapturous 
most, a lovely Frenzy? — But my vow? Even if 
indulgence were given free to those in Heaven, 
does He not desire that while enmewed in the 
prison-school of flesh, the soul shall take its dis- 
cipline as nobly as it can, till the last bell knolls us 
to everlasting play? 

Sint. But the vow was forced upon thee. It is not 
really thine own, but another's. 

Lov. But 'twas I that spoke the vow. 'Tis a solemn 
promise. Honour cannot tear the bond, imposed 
by itself upon itself. 

Sint. But if rendered to one, who disavows the recog- 
nition of that bond, it were surely to Him a grate- 
ful and a gracious act, that thou shouldst likewise 
ignore the binding quality, both in letter and the 
spirit, and break in every loving sense, thy hateful 
word. Unwitting of God's desires, thou settest 
thyself to do for Him, an evil and repulsive thing. 

Lov. Ah, thou art a sophist ! A promise remains a 
promise. 

Sint. If thou, uninspired by God, promised to kill thy 
unborn child, would He not deem it a lesser sin, 
that thou shouldst slay thy word, and bring forth 
the babe to dance and sing? — and listen rapt to the 
Heaven it ponders on, which thou thyself canst 
neither see nor hear? 

Lov. Yes. There is truth in that. But dedicating 
one's life to God is not a sin. 

Sint. But dost thou dedicate the best bv the murder 



51 



of the spirit, or by giving joy, and growth of finer 
being, to thyself, and yet another, and still others? 
What is right and the law with Nature, I take it, 
is right and the law with God. He has willed in- 
crease to man^by no other process than by unions. 
What better fruit canst thou find than the child, 
who looks on Earth with the clean, glad eyes of 
those who, in Paradise, see a sweet root and seed 
in everything, because in all things they see the 
flowers of God? 

Art thou now afraid to take my hand? 

LfOv. I am. Some amorous, giant Fury has gotten 
herself within my inmost wall, and shakes the bul- 
warks of my heart. I never till now have felt such 
leaps of passion, in my blood, shall I say? — or, in 
my soul? Or, is it both? I would, if I went by 
craving only, eat and drink thee both. My whole 
being writhes around thee. If I dared shut my 
eyes, and thou daredst circle me fast and hard, my 
brains would whirl around with that spinning mar- 
row, which pertains not to me alone, but thee as 
well, and which doubtless is the married essence 
of our conjointed spirits. 

Sint. O, foolish one ! Why deny thyself, and me, the 
Parnassian joy, that otherwise such mortals as our- 
selves, without the cup that drunken Hebe now 
drops upon our heads, shall never know again? In 
any case, death is my portion shortly. My soul 
tells me so. The Sibyl too denies it not. If thou 
be delivered to the nuns and monks again, as 'tis 
most like — thou too art doomed. — Let us squeeze 
this juice of sweetest frenzy while we may! We 
shall die, then, with the fullest knowledge, in that 
content, which he and she cannot enjoy who read 
in the book of memory, ''ass" and "neglected op- 

52 



portunity", in one accusing line against them- 
selves. 

(He offers to grasp her.) 

Lov. Oh, touch me not ! 

Once thy hand is on me, I shall lose all resist- 
ance. Yet a little more of this inner tempest, with 
SL\er)f^/c, niy sjpprfng anchors finding no rocks to catch upon, 
and I cannot, nor I shall not, keep my barque 
from oft" thy shore. My inmost rushing is like an 
earthquake's flood, and I but a willing wisp upon 
the headlong stream of my desires. 

Oh, that I could say that which I dare not, take 
me to thy very depths, and let me, as a Naiad, cling 
to the sweet shell grottoes, I there find in all thy 
cavities, my fount of life ! — my ever wonder-reveal- 
ing jet of shivering joy ! 

Sint. The temple of the true God is not like Raider's, 
or the Groves of Zeus, profaned by those who pas- 
sion with a love which, not barring the Highest, is 
extended to the very uttermost. 

Lov. But I am sure, this tumult is not of the soul 
merely. Is this the spell that under the Mount of 
Venus, beguiled Tannhauser's spirit into the lap- 
ping of those living cups, whose bubbles drove him 
to the dreams that, with open eyes, go with 
Maenads' madness? I have read of philtres too, 
^ that, concocted of the physic elements, enraged the 

veins of saints, so that they, in a sense, rose up 
against themselves and shot their guardian angels. 

Sint. Thou hast lighted, I have no doubt, upon the 
cause that troubles so our burning blood. 

I have felt this craving to my cost and shame 
before. I believe, we are tampered with. A little 
monster of the name of Kack once used me so. I 
ordered him the lash. They gave it to him from 

53 



head to foot, till he swooiled away, and after, with 
all his goods beneath him on a jade, he was bidden 
never to show his face again, unless he wished it 
targe for lances. It was he that taught me the 
Black Art. I bargained with him so, though I 
knew him dangerous to my health and peace. And 
the cats-paw, with a bandage or two, returned 
whence she came. 

Now there is none but the Sibyl, who in my cas- 
tles has the slightest knowledge of drug and magic. 
But she is of such cast of soul, I would swear by 
her as by my mother, that unless her mind gave 
way, she would not use me other than I would 
myself. Yet someone has got to the drink with 
the Fly of Spain, or some accursed root, or dust, 
of which I never heard. 

LrOv. Well, even if it be so, why should we not turn 
the laugh of Hell against itself? Can we not sat- 
isfy our hunger with a long and close embrace? 
What, if we do both swoon together? Where in 
that is there sin? 

Sint. We cannot but lose our virtue quite, if we press 
together, and thus open, such bottles as ourselves. 

L,ov. But to speak more plainly, what in Heaven's 
name, can come of this to be a lasting cause for 
sorrow? Somethinsf within, I will confess, im- 
pelled me to resist my yearnings, but I saw no 
reason beyond a superstitious dread of what was 
truly nothing. 

Sint. The women, who gave thee spoon-meat, were 
but cronies of an elder day, and those were really 
bashful men. They left thee to one bolder, yet 
more tremulous than they, a scamping husband, to 
teach thee physiology with his pupil and himself 
as map and model. 

54 



Lov. Tell me what this Judas crime verily is, that 
hiding in sweet ambush, betrays the lovers in their 
kiss ! 

Sint. That I cannot do, except I push thee over the 
indescribable precipice. Only by falling so, can I 
reveal to thee without speech, the harm we do our 
breaking heads, by coupling them thus together. 

Lov. Thou dost not explain by swinging before my 
eyes, nothing but a long string of tropes. Show 
me clearly what thou meanest. 

Sint. Then I must hold thee in my arms — though to 
take thee by the palms even would be madness. 

Lov. No ! That would be the delight of full-eyed 
sanity, life in hey-day song ! 

I smell no sin in that, which is perfume to its 

God. 'Tis the error of enchantment, not a fault of 

ours, when Ecstacy gags tell-tale fear with fingers 

• and thoughts, that are rambling-crazy in their 

Corybantic joy. 

Sint. Well, after all, is not a fine feast a gift from 
Heaven? If eaten seldom, eaten with reason, 'tis 
meant we should, for our better health, go slow 
and deep with the sense of our souls into the 
depths, where the sweetest relish lies. 

Lov. Then, wise one, let me crush thee to myself. 
What picture, so limning a pair of souls mingling 
together with fervent clasp, does but inspire those 
that ponder cleanly, to trace the Genius of that 
picture to Him who, the Author of Freedom, is 
Himself the Holy of Holies. 

Sint. If but two spirits make one of themselves, with- 
out a license, 'tis we believe, ideal and blessed in 
Heaven. But somehow, when bodies operate as 
spirits do, most men feel, though the best doubt- 
ingly, 'tis for them indeed a crime. 

55 



LfOV. But on what grounds? 

Sint. Well, child, thou belongest to the free Golden 
Age — yet I wonder myself at times, whether we 
are not misruled by misconception. 

'Tis like that thou art right, and men but self- 
condemned by impure fancy — unclean thoughts, in 
that connection, but proving they keep their bodies 
foul. 

Lov. In that case, I challenge thee to a furious bout 
of arms. 

Sint. Ah, gracious frail one, it will grieve thee for ages 
after. 

Lov. I do not see it. 

Dost thou refuse to pick up the gage, I thus, 
threatening to hurl myself upon thee, have thrown 
against thy burning face? 

Sint. By Heaven, no ! 

Absolution, anyhow, sweeps all crime away. If 
not mean-hearted priests, we can absolve our- 
selves — or they can, from whom after this, we shall 
seek our pardon, the great Masters of Compassion. 
It may be that for a quicker progress upwards, the 
guides suffer us to flounder through a stream of 
sin, so that our struggles shall bring us to the 
much higher level, which as the base of a moun- 
tain, stands upon the other shore. — Let us then 
take our plunge together ! 

(He moves forward as if to take her in his arms. 
The apparition of the Lady Verena suddenly ap- 
pears. She holds up a warning hand.) 
(Sintram backs.) 

Sint. By God, it is not well then ! My sainted mother 
waves me back. She sees beyond, where we, en- 
veloped in the coloured mist of passion, cannot 
see. (The Ghost disappears.) It is madness and 

56 



death, in her opinion, seemingly, to give way to 
the sensuous hunger, unless the cup and dish have 
been sanctified first by sacrament. 

This, alas, upon the Earth, from those who there 
officiate, we cannot look to have. 

A Hell of Sorrow shall give us gulps, if we now 
spring out and down to where Persephone hangs 
her mortal fruit ; yet a Hell of Regret swallows up 
' our lives, and the highest pleasures pertaining to 
those human lives, if we do not feast forthwith 
upon that luscious, cooling food which, so full of 
seed, stands so ready at our hands, so easy to hide 
with and stow away, and deny all knowledge. 

Lov. If it be truly sin, to mingle without a ceremo- 
nial murmur, as the angels so, let us kneel and ask 
for the swift assuagement of the contending fires, 
that run so fierce to roll and join flame in flame. 
We may get guidance, after, how far we may pro- 
ceed, and sin no more even in desire. Ah me ! 
Shall we but kiss the air, and wave cold saluta- 
tions from afar? — Well, let us now ask in the 
silent depths, where Po.wer answers prayer, for an 
angel's counter-charm to the mad magic of our too 
seductive passions. 

Sint. That were a more truly knightly act than to 
overbear thee, as a minute back, I had despite a 
certain something's prompting, unleashed my soul 
to do. 

The apple of the full lovers' tree of knowledge is 
harmless in itself, but the good God, whose very 
urging is often, ''Fructify", perceives that for man, 
it is not well, at times, to pluck elation from hyme- 
neal trees. Though surpassing all in tense desire. 
Himself, the law of Him who inspires the divine 
fairy-land, is that the fruit shall be taken in such a 



way, so as not to brutalize the spirit of him, who 
from it sucks delight. It shall be regarded a ten- 
der minister, in touch with the Most High, not the 
raking and the wrecking master. 
Lov. Then kneel, and let the true Olympian Father 
impregn His children here with the yearnings that, 
so bold and free, are yet so sweet and clean. 

(Both kneel.) J^ s/'z/^fr ^^^ Laj>h V^a^v^^ 

Both T^'^'^ NeAj>S, 
MUSIC. 

(L. M. looks leering over the parapet, between 
the leaves. Suddenly his face becomes very seri- 
ous, and then as he sinks below, it assumes an 
angry scowl.) Th^ sfn^i-r J^t^^ff^^^s. 

Lov. The spell is broken ! 

I love thee still with sweet delirium in my soul, 
but my fingers no longer itch to drag thee into the 
outer bosom of my heart. 
Sint. I too am cooled — no longer a raging tool for the 
jinns and genii, that in leaguered cities, gorge 
through drunken victors — so ravenous for the gush 
of vital streams, they spill the life at every end of 
those they rape. 
XrOv. O, 'that we could so enter a nuptial home in 
Heaven's most giddy fairly-land, even now, in the 
self-same moment, and straightway out-revel, in 
riotry, the angels who have been long denied. 

Of what use now is this bleak and fasting, this 
soul-revolting world ! 

(Looking ofif, R.) 

Quick ! Thy sword ! 

Thou art betrayed ! 

(Men with drawn swords rush in. Sintram hurls 

58 



himself upon the nearest. The fighting gradually 
works off the stage, L.) 

(L. M. slips in from the right, and goes to the 
back of Lovisa, who is gazing off. He carries a 
quiver of poisoned arrows upon his back. A small 
bow is in his hand. After watching for some time, 
in great anxiety, Lovisa's hands go up to Heaven 
with thanks and exultation.) 
Lov. Aly lord has beaten them all ! 
L. M. But, nevertheless, he shall drop the red tears of 

misericordia, himself, this very night. 
Lov. Ah! (Shiver of dread.) 

She is spell-bound by his gleaming eyes. 
L. M. A\'ouldst thou love to see a holy tongue in the 
mouth of thy darling child? 
Look yonder ! 

Canst see from here, how it proclaims the truth 
of what I speak? It makes no sound, though. Nor 
does the child. And why? Why — oh why? What 
wouldst thou have from those that cannot die. 
Both are cold — the tongue is dead — the child is 
dead ! 
Lov. My God ! 

(She strives to go to the child.) 
(L. M. clutches her by the throat with one hand, 
his arm around her neck. He takes out a long 
blood-stained dagger, and holds it up in the air.) 
(It now grows comparatively dark.) 
L. M. Dost thou know this colour? 

The blood that ran from thee into this bastard, 
shall flow back to the very fountain of its being, 
the heart of that vile mother, who broke the Holy 
Script by papping before the eyes of the world 
such a smeared baboon — a cloutless, unclean, clot- 



59 



ty, red-skinned sucker of spiders' bags, begot of 
Scorpio ! — 

After thee, I will rasp thy raping lord with pois- 
oned arrows. 

Die, thou gut-wallower, thou sow, the pig's 
death! A squeal and a stick! — stuck (sabbing) — 
stuck! (stabbing.) 

(He lifts her upon the table, and drags the dag- 
ger's edge slowly across her throat. This lying on 
the table allows Sintram to sit and stand during his 
last speech.) 
L. M. Sob and suck! suck! suck! 

(Then he cries aloud, holding her dead body still, 
and flourishing high his long knife.) 
L. M. Thou beast beyond, get up with thy broken 
wind ! — Sintram, thou dupe and fool of fiends ! 
Leer-headed Leo! Ha — ha! Dost thou see? 

Lo — the blood of the darling thou ravished, and 
spots besides of the child that came from out her 
most beauteous breasts ! — ah, now how cold, how 
repulsive now to thy sweetest toss ! — 

All three a dying — all three ! 

Ha — ha! Thou comest — dost thou? 

(L. M. puts an arrow quickly to his bow, and 
shoots. 
L. M. A good shot — through the bull's pap ! But the 
feather shows ! 

(Running ofif to the parapet swiftly.) 

O, shame of Hell — to cleave so in painful slips 
the tender bridal bed ! 

Wife, lord and brat — sucker, each, of each and 
all! 

Cold — cold — pap and pappers ! — 

And the lust of life still boiling and a-bubbling 
on the floor ! 

60 



(L. M. disappears over the battlemento ) 

Ha ! ha ! ha ! 

(Laugh of intense hate and triumph from be- 
low—not only from L. M., but a lot of devils.) 

(Sintram staggers in with one hand upon his 
breast. He picks up a great rock, or other heavy 
article, and after slowly lifting it up over his head, 
while' leaning against the parapet, he lets it drop 
after the dwarf. He may hurl his sword mstead.) 

(Hideous screams of L. M., and cries of angry 
devils, followed by a strange, hollow, boomtng 
sound, like that used at the crossing of a chasm, in 
the play of "She", as performed at the London 
Gaiety by Sophie Eyre.) 

(It becomes completely dark, typifying Sin- 
tram's blindness, as he totters to the body of Lo- 
visa. He sinks slowly by its side.) 

INTERVAL. 



(A vision opens of a beautiful landscape, in 
golden or otherwise coloured light. A glade 
ascends in the centre. Far off, a lovely castle 
stands high perched, with the trees of a"^ garden 
showing at its base.) 

(This may be imagined only, through coloured 
mist.) 

(If the landscape be shown to the audience, 
wingless angels may close in about the dying Sin- 
tram. Sintram, during the darkness, has got Lo- 
visa's head upon his breast.) 
Sint. See, beloved ! 

Tis even as I dreamed, as the Sibyl taught me, 
we have a home already roofed, and filled through- 
out, and close at hand ! 



61 



It stands prepared to send forth, as the nucleus 
of a new controlling star, that radiant and blissful 
light, which is but ours. It shall presently spray 
on every hand, a stream of ecstacy which, like each 
of the rivers that run from the Throne of God, shall 
inspire poets and prophets, and such lovers as are 
in evil case, who yet have not achieved that most 
familiar, most music-full union, which not a cere- 
monial wedding, and though mad with joy, is well- 
beloved and even instigated by the Highest 
Heaven. 

Art thou gone? 

Then I speak no more, till I greet thee in yonder 
home and pleasaunce, which indeed is the outcome 
and the working of two souls, that blend as one. 

Maybe, I shall catch thee on the way. 

O God be praised ! — this world of pain and 
malice is no more, for us, the hateful master of 
desire. 

Like the angels, we are suns, henceforth, in 
Paradise ! ! 

END OF PLAY. 



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